TOWAMENCIN — Several dozen area residents, and a handful of local lawmakers, have now had a chance to see the Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission’s latest plans for the widening of the northern half of the turnpike’s Northeast Extension.

“The turnpike’s wised up, they’ve done a lot better, they have the stormwater (features) where they should be. To me, this tells me they’ve learned from the lower half,” said state Rep. Kate Harper, R-61st District.

Work has started in recent weeks on placing barriers along the shoulders of the northern half of the turnpike, which will be widened from two travel lanes to three in each direction between the Morris Road bridge and roughly a mile north of the Lansdale Interchange. Worcester based contractor Allan A. Myers was awarded the $198 million construction contract in March for the project, which will be funded by drivers’ toll dollars and includes widening of six mainline (road-level) bridges, five overhead bridges running above the turnpike, and the addition of new dedicated onramps to Sumneytown Pike by the time work wraps up in late 2016.

“We’ve participated in four meetings - this is the fifth - with the public so far, and the interaction has gotten better. As we give (neighbors) more information, it gets better,” said Bill Muzika, Project Manager for Allan Myers.

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Project officials have toured residents’ backyards to denote property lines in recent weeks, he said, but Wednesday night’s open house was held at the Towamencin Volunteer Fire Company’s firehouse on Bustard Road. That road will be closed and detoured via surrounding streets from July 2014 into May 2015 for demolition and reconstruction of the bridge carrying that road over the turnpike, Muzika said.

“Barriers are up on the main line, and on some of the ramps around the interchange, and we’re just going to grow each way from there, north and south,” he said. Once the lower half widening is done, likely by the end of 2014, the full three lanes will be opened and plenty of signs will be posted ahead of the merge down to two lanes where construction will be underway for, weather permitting, two more years, he said.

Residents living near the upcoming turnpike work had a chance to view detailed plans showing their property lines up-close-and-personal with the engineers and contractors who will be busily building adjacent to their yards.

Mark Methlie of Tricorn Drive in Upper Gwynedd said he came out to talk about a landscaped berm going in behind his house and several others along that street, and showed officials a photo of his backyard, alongside a second photo with the light between the trees blacked out by what he calls “a 35-foot wall of dirt behind my house.”

“I’m not real happy about it. They said it’s going to be seeded nicely, and it’s going to look a lot better than a wall. I don’t think any of us are really in favor of it,” he said.

Methlie has lived on Tricorn Driver for nearly four decades, and said during that time he has mowed grass on the turnpike property “at the expense of three riding mowers, and a fourth one running now” without any compensation from the turnpike commission, and won’t mow any more once the berm is built.

“I will no longer maintain an inch of their property, and if they’re not in compliance with the ordinances of the township, I will be reporting it. It’s as simple as that, whether it’s weed height, grass height, poison ivy, anything,” he said.

Farther north on Musket Drive, neighbors Rose Gannon and Beverly Hoover said they were glad to see the plans up close, and would rather have the noise barriers built behind their homes than the noise they hear now.

“I’ve felt pretty good about it all the time, because they were putting sound barriers in. It’s not on my property. I always knew that, because there are old markers right on the back (of my property), so I didn’t do too much because we knew they might be coming,” Hoover said.

Gannon said she’s followed the planning process for the Northeast Extension widening for the better part of a decade, since the lower half widening was still on the drawing board, and is taking a long view.

“We’ve known about this for a long time, so it’s interesting to see the construction they’ve been doing south of here. Now they’re coming to our section, and maybe in a couple of years we’ll be able to move back into our backyards - when it’s quiet,” Gannon said.

Project information and construction updates are available online at www.PATurnpike.com/ConstructionProjects/mpA20toA31, along with contact information for the officials involved in planning, constructing, and overseeing the project.